Lorenzo fighting hard for front row start and looking for podium battle

Yamaha Factory Racing’s Jorge Lorenzo put maximum effort into this afternoon’s qualifying session, delivering second place and a front row start ahead of Championship rival Casey Stoner for tomorrow’s Grand Prix of Czech Republic. The reigning World Champion was one of the fastest riders for the duration of the session, benefiting from improvements to his set up with a more stable YZR-M1 allowing him to pressure the competition at the top. Lorenzo led the session for a brief time and at the end of the session had missed pole by just 0.113 seconds.

Whilst qualifying was dry, the riders endured a wet final free practice in the morning, giving them an opportunity to find a good wet set up should tomorrow’s race bring rain. Lorenzo dominated the session with his revised set up, finishing in second just 0.005 seconds from the front. Spies took it easy for the morning, saving his strength for the qualifying practice and finishing the final free session in tenth, 0.768 from first.

Jorge Lorenzo – Position 2nd – Time 1.56.704 – Laps 25
“Yesterday things weren’t like we expected but we made some changes and improved braking to make the bike more stable. The lap time improved from that and we got a lot closer to Dani today and finished in front of Casey. The pace in the last laps was quite good so we’re happy. Big thanks to my team who worked hard to improve the bike. Tomorrow we aim for the podium or if it is possible to win the race.”

Wilco Zeelenberg – Yamaha Factory Racing Team Manager
“A very good qualifying, we’re happy with second place and we’re close to Pedrosa. The final result of the setting changes we made is also good which is what counts for the race. Of course we would have liked pole but there’s less pressure when you don’t have it! Jorge was very consistent in the 1’56s so a big improvement from yesterday and tyres are no problem for us. Let’s see what we can do tomorrow.”

Source: Yamaha Racing